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Guest Article: Treefort Music Festival's Eric Gilbert

While SXSW 2012 is currently taking over Austin, and the internet for that matter, another amazing music festival lurks right around the bend. Boise’s inaugural Treefort Music Festival takes place March 22-25. The emerging artist festival has a packed line-up, impressive for any festival, let alone one in its first year. Festival director and Finn Riggins band-member Eric Gilbert took some time to brief us on Boise’s creative scene, the festival’s background and what’s going on now.

I’m currently driving through Wyoming after a moonlit drive through the night in the Finn Riggins vanstallion “GG” on the front end of a little tour to SXSW and back.  Headed to Denver tonight, by Saturday we’ll be in Texas playing another festival called 35 Denton.  The last week or so has been a mad dash to get everything for Treefort Music Fest as in order as possible before my departure. Actually, ever since October 1st it’s been a mad dash. The inaugural Treefort Music Fest in Boise, ID begins four days after I fly home from SXSW.  One might find this travel timing a little foolish seeing as though I’m the festival director and talent buyer for Treefort, but a huge part of the last five months has been assembling an all-star team to make sure we put our best foot forward in this first year of the festival.  I left town with great confidence in the community that has risen around this new festival and the amount of talented, kind and generous people that have not only offered support but are backing that up with a lot of their own time and energy.  That’s why I love Boise and that’s a big reason why fellow festival founders Lori Shandro and Drew Lorona from Duck Club Productions and I felt that something like this could work in this town.

The question before me is why we started Treefort Music Fest.  Over the last several years I’ve been touring the country quite heavily with my band Finn Riggins and along the way have played several festivals of this style — urban multi-venue emerging artist fests — like SXSW in Austin, MFNW in Portland, The UMS in Denver, CMJ in New York and several more of smaller scale.  I really love how festivals like these gather underground and emerging artists from all over the country in one spot for a weekend — as an artist it’s fun to congregate with band friends from all over, sort of feels like band camp or a reunion with fellow rock’n’roll soldiers.  I also have always enjoyed the opportunity to get to know the host town and the scene happening there more intimately.  The idea had been thrown around the last couple of years amongst friends that it would be great for Boise to host one of these festivals to showcase our own scene, but also to introduce Boise to more up-and-coming bands that those of us in the midst of it get to experience on a regular basis.

Last year, the Boise music scene took some significant strides that helped set the stage for Treefort Music Fest.  One of the biggest developments was Radio Boise KRBX 89.9 FM going on air.  Since the mid-1980s when Boise State University student radio became an NPR affiliate the Treasure Valley had been without any sort of freeform non-commercial radio with volunteer DJs and diverse programming.  With the Treasure Valley’s first community radio station — Radio Boise — going on air in April 2011 it found very fertile ground and enthusiasm for this refreshing new approach to radio in the Boise area.  Radio Boise has been giving heavy doses of airtime to wide variety of programming and news, including the most airplay for emerging and local artists since the fall of student run radio at BSU in the 80s.  The rise of Radio Boise coupled with a growing buzz nationally for the local music scene — thanks to the recent success of Youth Lagoon and others — it just felt like the right time for Boise to play host to the national and regional scene with our very own emerging artist festival.

The vision with Treefort Music Fest is for this to be the beginning of a yearly tradition, much like many of the festivals around the country that have come before us.  Two weeks from today it starts.  We’re still hustling, but feeling great about where we’re at in the planning phases.  Looking forward to experiencing 35 Denton this weekend and SXSW next week and then home to enjoy the fruits of our labor and share nearly 140 incredible emerging artists with all the Treefort festival goers — as well as a host of local breweries, performance art, printed art, visual art, industry panels, artist workshops at Boise Rock School, Radio Boise, independent record store The Record Exchange, food trucks, hotels, small business, screenprinters, makers of all sorts and a bunch more goodness to be found amidst the vibrant downtown Boise scene.  We’re proud Idahoans, and excited to play host for a long weekend.

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Watch for future Treefort Music Festival preview coverage soon 

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